Deals with the devil
by solussword
Summary: Dumbledore attempts to make right by dealing with the devil


**A/N: Okay, so, here's another plot bunny that struck me a while back, and I haven't really thought about it till now, since I finally started posting my crap. This little chapteret is just a prelude, really. I don't have any real ideas about where this story will go, or what will drive it. If you like it, great, tell me, and I might, if you want me to, figure out the next chapter.**

**AA/N: So, basically, in my very, very rough outline, I have ol' Dumbles atoning for his sins, wanting to right the wrongs and whatnot. So he goes to the devil, asking for James and Lilly Potter to be brought back to life. The devil, in his (what we'll call for now, it'll probably change later,) generosity, asks what else he could do for him. At the end of this chapteret, it has the devil apparently sending back all the people that Harry loved back, in exchange for the rights to Albus's soul. Hopefully, if anyone likes the story, we get everyone back after the war, and have a merry time celebrating their loved ones occult reawakening. It'll be complex, annoyingly angsty and dramatic, with some bad humor mixed in. That's about it. Read on.  
**

Albus Percival wulfric Dumbledore strode confidently through the halls of the damned. Bright red lava washed angrily across the reddened marble, flowing around and ahead of the newly deceased headmaster. The dead barely knew him. Upstairs (that was what they called it, upstairs), it was a solid three years since the war ended.

You lose track of time when you're dead.

The pillars on either side of the hall where white, slick with what looked like a very hot sheen of magma. Skeletal hands reached up from either sides of the hall as Dumbledore marched across the hall, screams and moans competing for attention against the sounds whooshing air as lava cooled and heated up.

Either he didn't here, or just ignored it, Grindewalds slayer kept his chin high, somehow not tripping on his massive beard. Eventually (Years or seconds, it was all irrelevant here,) he stepped in front of a throne cast in shadow. He could just make out a large pair of feet, the big toe half his size. The foot was braced against a macarbe display of bones and skin. He assumed that process that they were put there was unpleasant for the owners of the bones.

He kneeled.

A voice, older than time or man, bid him: "Rise, Albus Dumbledore. Tell me what you have come here for."

He rose, head bowed. "Lord of darkness, you know why I've come. To repent."

The lord of the damned snorted. "Fine then. Asking repentance from the devil is not the smartest thing to do. Are you sure you want to continue? There is no turning back after this point."

Dumbledore nodded his head. "This is the only way."

A voice, not so much as said but summoned into existence, boomed out the words:

SO BE IT.

The throne, which had been in shadow, produced a clawed hand. The hand reached down, grasped all of the headmaster in one firm grip.

YOUR NAME, HUMAN.

Not bothering to struggle, Albus responded in his best strangled noble voice, "Albus Percival Wolfric Dumbledore."

The hand squeezed harder, and several of his bones contracted, almost screamed in pain, then shattered. The pain ripped along every limb in his body, clawed its way through his brain, and crushed his innards. It was all he could do to stay on the verge of consciousness.

WHO DO YOU WISH TO BRING BACK?

With tears of pain filling his eyes, he sobbed "James and Lilly potter."

Another hand reached down and gently put a claw on the top of his head.

DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE RISKS?

Squirming and screaming, he babbled "Yes, yes, yesyesyesyesyes, I understand!"

As kind as the voice of Satan could be, it said: Anyone Else?

Through the fog of mind warping pain, he thought, then said "Alastor Moody, Sirius Black," His voice cracked. "Fred Weasly."

The voice rumbled, as if thinking something over.

HUMAN, IF YOUR APPRENTICE SUCCEEDS, YOU WILL BE SET FREE. UNTIL THEN, YOU KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE.

Albus, still in the throes of unimaginable pain, merely nodded.

Then blackness engulfed the scene, and Harry, poor, confused Harry, woke up sweating and swearing, knowing that whatever peace he had gotten when the war ended was going to be brutally, painfully ripped away from him.

**AAA/N: So, again, I have a vauge clue where this story is going, but no real drive to write anything, unless someone wants to know what happens to Harry and company.**

**AAAA/N: (Holy crap, I managed to add three hundred words to this story from authors notes alone. I'm just a big gas bag...)  
**


End file.
